


a place on Earth, with you

by melonbug



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: AU, Angst, Anxiety, Death, End of the World, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction, M/M, Sadness, Sexual Content, Suicidal Ideation, Victor is a ballerina, eating disorder mention, hopelessness, there's anxiety in this story and it will also probably give you anxiety, you will cry i promise, yuri is 18+
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-02
Updated: 2018-04-11
Packaged: 2018-09-14 07:59:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 16,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9169666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/melonbug/pseuds/melonbug
Summary: Yuuri didn’t want to die,he didn’t want to die.And he didn't want to die alone.The world was ending, and they were just two souls, desperate for someone to share their final days with.-Across the ocean, Otabek meets Yuri. Their sentence had already been set--they were all going to die--but maybe, Otabek thought, their meeting was fate.A Seeking a Friend for the End of the World AU





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> my crops are dying, water them with your tears

17 days left.

“ —asteroid  Matilda, seventy miles wide, on a collision course with the Earth —”

The broadcast was on a loop, the anchor’s voice sad and dead and monotone, the broadcast itself the purgatory before the coming hell. It had been on loop for almost seventy two hours now, barring brief interludes that only bore worse news.: mass suicides, looting, violence.

Yuuri sat on the sofa of his too cold apartment, curled beneath a thin blanket, and watched the television with red rimmed, heavy eyes, because surely it was a joke, they would cut back to the show he’d been watching when the interruption had first come, with an April’s Fools or a Prank’d or  _ something _ , only he had been watching nearly nonstop for three days now and nothing came of it but increasing terror and anxiety.

He’d cried when the news had broken; he’d cried until his wretched sobbing had turned to hyperventilation and dry heaving. He’d cry until he was spent, and he had seventeen days left to go.

He’d spoken to his mother already, his father and his sister, even Yuuko and Minako. And Yuuko had been the hardest, because she had the triplets and she had told him, between bouts of crying, that they didn’t understand, they were so young, and they just  _ didn’t understand _ . And Yuuri felt guilty, because here he sat mourning the life he would never have and he had given no thought to the life  _ they _ would never have, too young to even understand why.

He mourned everything, but most of all he mourned being alone, dying alone in his drafty apartment, with it’s creaky floorboards and cracked walls and peeling paint. His roommate, and his best friend, had left just a week before, to visit his family over the holidays in Thailand, and Yuuri had spoken with him more times than his own family, had cried with him long into the night, in a way he hadn’t been able to stand doing with his own mother, who had had to say goodbye to her son via a telephone call.

The airports had closed day one, stranding everyone where they were, and in Yuuri’s case, on the other side of the world from his family, his best friend, all the people in the world who cared for him, and he wanted to be strong for his mother, so she could have that, at least.

And then in a fit of anger, when his phone died mid conversation with Phichit, he had chucked it across the room, screaming out all of the rage and the fear and the horror, and it’s screen had shattered and it had refused to boot back up, even after desperate praying as he’d plugged it in.

It sat on the table in front of him now, a reminder of his idiocy, but it needn’t have mattered because just an hour earlier the broadcast had cut back to a live feed and the sad man was still there, telling them that cell towers had gone down, from interference from the coming asteroid, that water and power might be next to go. And then it had returned to its depressing loop and Yuuri had remained where he was, desperate for the other shoe to drop, for the sad man to return and tell the world it was only a joke, a bad joke, and they would all see another day, the world would keep on turning.

(and the world  _ would  _ keep on turning, after the impact, only none of them would be there)

And that was how far he’d come in only three days: through denial and anger and all the way around into bargaining, and he sat trembling, eyes itchy from tears, body limp and weary from lack of sleep, and he felt numb as he wished, prayed, begged to any higher power that would listen that it just be a bad joke.

(it wasn’t a bad joke, it wasn’t even a joke at all)

 

—

 

15 days left and he had run out of cares to give, going through the motion, numb, terrifyingly numb. He had cleaned the kitchen at some point, swept the creaky floors, cooked and ate, picking at what little food he had left in the pantry and wishing he’d gone to the store before all the chaos had started, because he had enough for a few days, maybe more if he conserved it properly.

The lack of noise on the street below, the sirens in the distance, honking horns, all those things that normally made up the siren song of the city were now noticeably absent, replaced by eerie silence, by the occasional sobbing or breaking of glass or the rare car driving by, slushing through the snow.

People had evacuated the city in droves, heading everywhere and anywhere, and Yuuri had considered it but he had no car and nowhere to really go, and so he had stayed in his apartment that he hated at the best of times, a pittance that he and Phichit had barely been able to afford but served its purpose well enough.

And now the city was a ghost of what it had been, was dead and quiet with only those poor souls left who had nowhere else to go. Like him.

 

—

 

_ 14 days left _ and there was movement in the hallway outside of his apartment, where there had been nothing but unnerving silence for days. And, curious, Yuuri cracked open his door to the shadow of a figure passing by, to the sound of soft footsteps disappearing up the stairwell that led only to the roof access from there, because Yuuri was cursed enough to be on the top floor. He padded after in socked feet; he had nothing to do and he was curious and he was bored, and his boredom had begun to bring him full circle back into grief and he longed for something, anything to break the monotony.

He stepped carefully through the doorway onto the roof, soaking his feet frigid in the melting ice there; he hardly noticed, though, because the person he had been following was there, standing at the ledge and looking out across the dark, empty street.

All at once Yuuri was horrified the man would jump, though he wasn’t certain why. The man was a stranger, grieving the end of the world in his own way, but Yuuri was still human and couldn’t stop himself. “Don’t— Don’t do it,” he called out in alarm, stepping forward but drawing short as the man turned, silver hair spilling out around him, cascading out and around his shoulders and about his face. He looked pensive and he looked sad, face flushed red in the chill of the evening.

“I’m not going to jump,” the man said after a moment, in a thick Russian accent, and Yuuri felt the breath he didn’t realize he had been holding escape him. It had been the first voice he had heard in days besides his own and the sad drawl of the tv man. “But would it not be better this way? To die on my own terms than from the inevitable?” The man lifted his gaze to the darkened sky. It was a bright night, the distant stars bleeding light across the otherwise dark sky, and there was one of them brighter and larger than the others— Matilda, the asteroid bearing down on them, their death written across the sky so they wouldn’t forget it was coming.

And the man wasn’t wrong, Yuuri had certainly considered it himself. Had thought it perhaps better, easier than spending everyday going through the motions of a withering life, swallowing down anxiety until it bubbled forth, at last, sending him into bouts of hysteria, drowning him in his own fear and tears. He was anxious of the coming doom, but he was also tired and listless and, in some part, ready for it to happen, for the torture of waiting to end.

And he didn’t want to die,  _ he didn’t want to die _ .

“What’s your name?” Yuuri asked, curling his toes into the cold rooftop.

The man considered him for a bit with soft eyes, the kind of eyes that must have sparkled once; they were only empty now. “Victor,” he said quietly, stepping from the ledge.

“Would you— Would you like to come inside?” Yuuri asked, licking his lips. “I, uhh, I don’t have much food left, but I have coffee?” Maybe. Maybe he had coffee, he couldn’t remember, but it was something enough to maybe lure the man down from the rooftop.

And so Victor nodded and followed him down.

Yuuri stripped off his wet socks at the door, tossing them aside and shivering as he stepped onto cold wood floors that did little for how bonecold his feet had become in his brief time on the roof. Victor was silent as he followed him in and Yuuri gestured to his kitchen.

He had never really been one for house guests, it had been more Phichit’s thing to have people over, and he felt awkward as he stood in the kitchen next to the man, fumbling with the coffee pot. But he did have coffee—even if it was old and expired—and he set it brewing.

He reached up to pull mugs from the cabinet, stretching onto his tippy toes because they kept them in the high shelf, because the apartment had too few cabinets and too little space to keep things lower down. He dropped one as he brought them down and it fell hard and shattered across the broken tiles of the kitchen floor, over Yuuri’s bare feet. It had been Phichit’s favorite mug, Yuuri realized belatedly, as he stared down at the glass, stunned, hands still shaking where they held the other mug. And the rest of him was now shaking, too, shoulders trembling, chest heaving as he struggled to breath. And then the vision of glass was obscured with moisture, as hot tears finally escaped him, the first tears in days, and he screamed, throwing the other mug down hard, watching through distorted vision as it, too, spread fine shards everywhere.

He fell back against the counter, throwing his head back, gripping the edge white knuckled to stop himself falling, and he was certain, in the periphery of his anxiety and anger, that he had stepped into the shards, and the pain was there, certainly, and said enough.

There were hands on him a moment later, shaking him and moving him, and he stumbled forward, perhaps stepping in more glass, perhaps not, and he choked back another sob, delirious on his tears, all sound gone except the ringing pressure in his ears, and another sound that might have been his own angry screams.

He came back to himself on his sofa, blanket around him as it had been when the news first broke, when he’d been laughing over something dumb on his phone, sitcom playing faintly in the background. Only now he was numb, body heavy, limbs heavy, throat raw, his feet a smear of pain across all the other feelings he was feeling.

And he took a deep breath, ragged and hoarse, and he cried, pressing his hands to his face, curling downwards and inwards into himself as if he could keep going, keep curling up until he ceased to exist.

Victor was beside him, he realized belatedly—he had forgotten all about him—and he lifted his head from where it had been pressed into his palms—his glasses were gone, they’d been removed at some point—and he looked at the blurry outline of silver hair and narrow face, high cheekbones, and he felt suddenly embarrassed.

“I— I’m sorry, I’m so sorry—” he managed, voice practically a wheeze, and the man said nothing, only sat with him as he tried to calm himself down.

Eventually he did, and again Victor barely said a word, only guiding him back until his feet were in the man’s lap; they hurt, prin picked all over with  _ pain _ , and Victor set about them, slowly and carefully pulling shards of glass out with a pair of tweezers and they tink _ tinked _ onto his glass coffee table as they were dropped there.

Yuuri refused to look at him and instead cast his gaze up to the ceiling.

“I didn’t get your name,” Victor said as he worked, hands steady, and Yuuri flushed, flinching with every new shard of ceramic pulled from his heel, body shaking from exhaustion and pain.

“Yuuri,” he whispered, and Victor maybe cracked a smile, he couldn’t tell without his glasses. And as if sensing his troubles or perhaps noticing the way he squinted as he watched him, Victor paused and suddenly his glasses were being pushed into his hands.

He slipped them on and they were tear stained and smudged, but his vision was clearer; Victor came into focus, face serious in concentration as he continued his careful work on Yuuri’s feet, which were blood stained with drying streaks of brown-red.

He grit his teeth and looked away from the blood, focusing instead on Victor’s face: thin and elegant, almost feminine. He spoke and it was sultry, his accent lovely but his English flawless. “I know a Yuri,” he told him, followed by a flinch from Yuuri and another tink _ tink _ of glass on glass as he dropped another shard of ceramic onto the table. “Back in Russia.” And he didn’t say what Yuuri knew he was thinking. He would never see his Yuri again.

The man shifted, setting one foot aside and moving to the other; Yuuri dared to look again and realized Victor’s pants were dark with bits of blood. “I’ve bled on you,” he murmured, throwing an arm across his eyes, skewing his glasses and driving them hard into his nose.

“It’s alright,” Victor told him, and he sounded far different from the sad man who had stood on the roof, considering the fall down to the pavement below. He sounded less tired and a bit more alive.

Yuuri no longer felt alive, hadn’t felt alive in weeks, even before the sad man had appeared on the television and cursed them all with knowledge Yuuri wished he hadn’t. He wished he had been given the opportunity to go on living his mediocre life in ignorant bliss; the end would come before they could even see it coming, had the news not been broadcast to the entire world.

Victor cast his feet aside gently, standing. “Done,” he said, stepping over to the kitchen, and Yuuri realized he must have swept up the glass at some point, because he moved unobstructed where broken mugs had been before. He returned a moment later with a cool cloth, returning to his feet and wiping away the blood, and then he pressed two small pulls into Yuuri’s hand and, a moment later, a glass of water.

“For the pain,” Victor told him. “Tylenol—was all I could find.”

Yuuri swallowed them down in a daze as Victor sat back down and began wrapping his feet in gauze, a steady, practiced motion. He didn’t even realized he’d had gauze in the apartment.

“Are you a doctor?” Yuuri asked and immediately realized the ridiculousness of what he had said. The man hardly seemed the doctor type and a doctor would never have lived in the shithole part of town they were in.

Victor laughed— it was a soft tinkle of noise that Yuuri found he quite enjoyed hearing—but his laughter gave credence to the ridiculousness of what he had said. “I suspect if I were a doctor, I’d live in a nicer part of town,” and his eyes, when he met Yuuri’s, sparkled with mirth, “I do ballet, I have practice in dealing with foot injuries.”

Yuuri stared back at him, unsure if he had heard correctly. “You’re a ballerina?”

“Was,” Victor corrected softly. “I haven’t shown up to rehearsal since—” He trailed off, letting the silence speak for itself as he finally finished with Yuuri’s feet. He didn’t move them though, and Yuuri was affection starved enough that he let them stay in this stranger’s lap, because he would be dead soon enough and it hardly mattered if he overstepped. And Victor seemed comfortable enough.

Yuuri cleared his throat. “I’m sorry, about— about before. “ He wasn’t truly, because he felt suddenly better, but he was sorry, at the very least, that Victor had to see it.

“We all cope in our own ways,” Victor told him and in the following silence Yuuri realized the steady monotone of the sad anchor on the television was missing; he looked over to see the broadcast had been cut, the screen replaced with bars of color and blackness. The feed had stopped, finally, and now they were only left to wonder with the silence of their own misery and the steady ugly static emanating from the now useless television he and Phichit had pitched in for together the Christmas before.

Suddenly the thought of being alone with the noise and with the empty apartment made his heart ache in a way it hadn’t before. Victor was a stranger but it didn’t matter, he was someone. “Do you have someone?” he asked, throat tight, thinking of his parents, of Yuuko and Tokeshi and the triplets. Minako. Phichit.

Victor shook his head, looking again like the man from the roof. “Everyone is back in Russia,” he murmured. “I have no one here worth dying with.” And he sounded so lonely as he said it and Yuuri felt the pain.

“Would you like to stay here?” he asked. “I have a spare bedroom.” And it was obvious what he meant between the lines.  _ Stay here, please, so I don’t have to die alone, and you don’t have to die alone, either. _

“Ok,” Victor said, and that was that, two souls desperate for someone to share their final days with.

In the kitchen, the coffee was still warm and Victor poured it into mugs for then. Yuuri barely trusted himself as Victor handed it over to him, but he curled steadier hands around it, the warmth seeping through into his frigid fingers. “Cream?” Victor asked, and Yuuri nodded as the man opened the fridge and then Yuuri’s blood ran cold.

“Oh,” he said. “I don’t have much food left. I don’t think the stores are—” He stopped, because he didn’t want to think of that. “I have, uhh, instant ramen, lots of it, but that’s it.”

And there was no cream in the fridge, no powdered creamer in the pantry, and so Yuuri instead dumped too much sugar into his coffee to make it bearable and began choking it down, because it felt too awkward to pour it out now, after his tantrum in the kitchen while making it before.

“I have food in my apartment,” Victor told him, and Yuuri blinked at him from over his mug, held close to his face to better soak in the warmth.

“Oh,” he said.

“I live a floor below,” Victor continued. “We’ve been neighbors for years, I’ve seen you and your boyfriend around once or twice.” Yuuri choked on a sip of coffee, though this time not from how awful it was.

“Phichit,” he murmured weakly. “He was my, uh, my roommate. Only my roommate.”

Victor made a noise of understanding, and Yuuri continued, setting his mug down with a clink, giving up on it because it was nothing more than sugar water and coffee grounds. “I don’t remember you,” he said, honestly, because he would’ve if he had ever seen the man, because Victor was beautiful, tall and elegant and slender, every bit the type of feminine handsome that Yuuri would expect from a ballet dancer.

Victor took no offense to the statement and only shrugged, eyes on his mug. “I keep odd hours,” he said, and there was something there that Yuuri couldn’t quite pick up on, something sad and somber. But he spoke no more on it, at last sipping at his shitty coffee.

Victor eventually left for his own apartment, and in the resulting silence Yuuri felt his anxiety return full tilt. He curled up on the sofa, blanket again around him, though it did little for the cold creeping in from the drafty window nearby. Outside, the falling snow was a wash of white in the otherwise dark night and he stared at it, losing himself in the peacefulness of it all, remembering snow from his childhood, how beautiful it had once seemed.

It didn’t seem beautiful now, only sad.

Yuuri thought, after a bit, that Victor wouldn’t return, had perhaps only lingered out of some sense of pity and had taken the opportunity to flee, but eventually he came back, loaded down with boxes, of food and of clothing, shirts hanging from the sides, blankets draped all about him so much so that Yuuri wondered how he had managed the trip back up the stairs.

Maybe he had taken the elevator, but it only worked right half the time so Yuuri blamed the ballerina grace the man had and called it a day on the thought.

Yuuri made no move to help him, numb, feet hurting from the brief time he had spent standing in the kitchen and Victor seemed wholly unbothered as he haphazardly crammed food in the fridge. It wasn’t much, but it was essentials enough to get them through. They would hardly starve in two weeks, even if there had been no food.

They’d still make it to the end, only now maybe they’d do it with a little more comfort.

The box of clothes was dropped into his own bedroom, and Yuuri hadn’t the energy to correct him, to tell him that the one just passed it was Phichit’s room, where he could stay.

Then Victor came over quietly draping more blankets around them as he curled up beside Yuuri; his last image was of the man’s hair falling about his shoulders as he dropped his head there, and then he was asleep.

 

—

 

He woke in the early morning hours— _ thirteen days left _ —and he yawned and stretched, his feet hurting, the sunlight blinding where it shone through the window, reflecting off of freshly fallen snow. Victor was beside him, sprawled almost across him on the tiny sofa that barely held two sitting comfortably but now held two spread out across it.

He was heavy against him, head pressed against his side, curled tight in the small space, and Yuuri was far from comfortable but enjoyed it all the same. Someone, there and present and equally as alone in the world.

He stirred, elbow digging into Yuuri’s ribs as he shuffled into a sitting position. His hair was stuck up at all angles, messy and everywhere unlike the softness it had held the day before, and Yuuri almost laughed but couldn’t find the strength to.

“Morning,” he said blearily and Victor smiled and it was genuine and nice and warmed him and he managed to smile as well.

13 days left, only 13 days but they would be 13 days not spent alone. It helped, marginally.

Victor insisted on making them breakfast, insisted Yuuri stay off his feet a bit, lest he tear open the small cuts that littered them, and Yuuri made no protest otherwise. He’d bound himself mostly to the sofa for days already and he didn’t see it fit to change that now.

Breakfast was eggs, courtesy of Victor’s fridge, and toast, courtesy of Victor’s pantry, and it was nice enough because Yuuri had before only been subsisting on water; stale chips that Phichit had left, a flavor he hated but ate anyway because it reminded him of his friend; rice cooked too long in his rice cooker; some canned soup he’d found at the back of the pantry, expired earlier that year.

So eggs and toast, hot and buttered, was nice and he ate from his spot on the sofa, Victor next to him.

“Where are you from?” he asked as Yuuri shoveled down food with all the elegance of someone hungry and dying soon.

“Japan,” he told him once he’d swallowed his mouthful of bread. “Hasetsu,” and then the sadness came on again. “It’s lovely there,” he continued, quieter. “It’s on the beach, but it’s a dying tourist spot. There’s a castle.” And it was all the things he loved about his hometown, condensed into a checklist of mediocre descriptions. “It’s nice,” he finished lamely.

He didn’t ask Victor where he was from, because his accent gave it away, his earlier statement about his family in Russia enough for him to make the connection. But he wished he had, because a moment later Victor told him anyway. “I’m from St. Petersburg,” he murmured, barely touching his food. “It’s cold there.” And his gaze wandered to the window, to the bright white of the snow settled on the window sill.

“Does it snow often?” Yuuri asked.

“Yes, very often.”

It was awkward in that way most of the day, Victor cleaning their dishes as if dishes left in the sink would suddenly be a horrible injustice to his apartment. There had always been dishes in the sink when Phichit had been there, and it made it feel a bit less like home.

Victor was joyful, outside of the small sad moments that only crossed his face when he thought Yuuri wasn’t looking, and he appreciated it a small bit and made an effort to hide his own grief. But they grieved and it was obvious in the way they danced around the topic.

“What did you do, before?” Victor asked and Yuuri, glued to his same spot on the sofa, shook his head.

“Boring desk work, but it paid the bills,” he told him. “But it hardly matters now. I’ve not shown up anymore. I don’t exactly need the money.” And it was a funny thought, how little materialism mattered now, when before he had scraped and saved for the small things: the television, a book here and there, nicer clothes, a ticket home to see his family. “And what about you? You did ballet?”

Victor nodded. “Since I was little, parents pushed me into it. But I enjoy it.  _ Enjoyed _ it, the ballet part, but not—” He sighed softly, smiling wistfully. “Not most of it, but the dancing I enjoyed.” And his words said enough about the unspoken unpleasantries of it, and Yuuri could only imagine. The man was more slender than most men at his height, and he’d picked at his food, and favored his stride in a way that clearly showed the pain he was in.

“Were you really thinking of jumping?” Yuuri asked all of a sudden, and Victor froze, one hand brushing through his long hair.

He didn’t speak for a long while, avoiding eye contact, eyes fixed on the window just passed Yuuri’s shoulder. “Yes,” he said. “I supposed if you hadn’t come along I would have done it.” And there were tears in his eyes when he again met Yuuri’s. “I— I don’t want to die like this,” he choked out, one hand coming up to wipe the tears away. “I don’t want— I don’t want to spend everyday, dreading—”

Then he cried fully, the tears too fast for him to stop, tilting his head back to hide the sobs, but it was clear. His shoulders shook gently and Yuuri reached out to brush the hair from his face, to do  _ something _ . Victor caught his hand as it tangled through his messy hair and he met his eyes once more; they were red and ringed tired, heavy bags beneath his eyes that Yuuri hadn’t noticed before.

“I’m glad you came,” he whispered. “I’m glad I won’t spend it alone.” His fingers twined themselves with Yuuri’s and he squeezed his hand like a lifeline and Yuuri felt selfish for his own tears.

He didn’t know Victor but it felt all at once as if he had known him forever. It didn’t matter either way, because of all the people he had ever know, Victor was the only one who was there with him now.

He carefully did not think of his parents, or of Phichit who had almost not been able to afford the flight home, but had been able to go because Yuuri had covered the difference, because he hadn’t enough for his own ticket home but could at least give that much to Phichit. An early Christmas gift, he’d insisted.

He wished he hadn’t done it from day one, and it was selfish,  _ selfish _ , and Yuuri didn’t mind being selfish here, because he deserved it, with so little time left. He deserved it, for the first time in his life. He was first, and only he was first.

And Victor was now second, not Phichit, not his family, not his childhood friend Yuuko. It was Victor, because Victor was  _ there _ .

He crossed the distance between them, sliding onto his hands and knees to bridge the gap and he caught Victor’s sweater and pulled him against him, into a kiss. And it felt the right thing to do, because he was selfish.

Victor froze against him, the man’s tears wet on his face, lashes fluttering against his own. And then he returned the kiss, arms catching Yuuri in return and dragging him against him and into his lap. And it was life again, as he wished it could be. Him, in the arms of someone else, so maybe he would feel less alone.

The kiss was sloppy and frantic, an edge of panic and urgency to it, because that was all they had. Tears and urgency and panic and not enough time in the world to enjoy it or anything else.

It was him and a stranger, hips slanted up against him where he straddled his lap.

And later, _after_ , when Victor was collapsed next to him in his bed, spent and exhausted, body porcelain against Yuuri’s dark sheets, Yuuri looked him over. He was thin, rib cage protruding, hips sharp: It was tragic, the odd twist in the bones of his feet, where they were distorted into odd angles. Yuuri didn’t know, knew about as much about ballet as he did physics or rocket science.

And Yuuri didn’t mention any of it, and didn’t bring up how pale Victor was the next morning, the time he spent shaking on the floor of the bathroom, throwing up. He was a brighter person afterward, hiding the tremor in his hands in the too long sleeves of his thermal, hiding whatever demons he had behind a too wide smile as he made them breakfast again.

And only briefly did he look ill, a fine sheen of sweat standing across his forehead, and he would close his eyes for a long moment and then open them once more and he would seem better.

Yuuri didn’t mention it, even as he grabbed Victor’s trembling hand and the man whispered, “You wouldn’t have liked who I was before.”

Victor wouldn’t have liked who he was before, either: boring desk job working Yuuri, who was anxious and paranoid and depressed (and still was, but had an excuse now), who spent his days doing not much of anything, going through the motions of life, monotonous and routine.

He barely remembered, as they curled up together on the sofa,  _ twelve days _ .

And the day was spent that way, seeking the warmth of each other in the chill of the apartment, talking about anything and everything but the one thing looming above them. Victor told Yuuri about growing up in Russia, the long, cold winters, the beauty of St. Petersburg, the beginnings of his ballet career.

He showed Yuuri en pointe, “Sloppy, hardly the real thing,” he said, dropping from it, “I don’t have my shoes,” and he laughed. “But I am a wonder, Yuuri, en pointe. It’s rare for a male dancer to do it, but I’m quite good.” His accent was thicker than usual, filled with the kind of fond memories nostalgia produced, though Yuuri could also hear the sadness beneath it all.

_ My parents pushed me into it _ , he had told Yuuri, and the man was careful to avoid any mention of his family in a way that was quite intentional. But he spoke about his friends back in Russia, the dog he had once had, about the Russian Yuri, as he called him.

And all the while he paced with all the grace of a dancer, and Yuuri was mesmerized where he sat, watching the man comb fingers through his hair, as if considering pulling it back, though Yuuri saw it for the nervous gesture it was, had taken all of a day to pick up on it. A shame, Yuuri thought, that he would never actually see Victor dance, because he spoke about it with such passion, and it warmed Yuuri’s heart to imagine him on a stage, en pointe.

“How’re your feet?” he asked and Yuuri frowned at the sudden tangent, because he’d almost forgotten the pain in them, which was barely more than a dull throb, sharper in places where the glass had dug in worse. But he felt fine, honest, and he told Victor as much, who came over to him, pulling him from the sofa.

Yuuri almost tripped in the blankets, stumbling to his feet and into Victor’s arms, and the man laughed loud, pushing aside his coffee table with his foot; it was still covered in bloody bits of ceramic, Yuuri realized, as he let Victor lead him out into the now clear floor. Victor’s hand was holding his, lifting his arm, and the other wrapped around him, settling soft in the small of his back.

“Oh,” Yuuri murmured, blushing, allowing Victor to pull him almost flush against him.

“Dance with me?” Victor asked, playful, smiling wide, and Yuuri allowed him to lead, to pull him into  _ stepstep step, stepstep step, _ and it was amazing, and Yuuri felt alive, more and more each moment. He struggled to maintain the rhythm, lacking the grace a professional as Victor had, but it was funnier with every stumble he made and he laughed more and harder and Victor laughed too, until they finally stopped, the two of them almost breathless, more from the effort of so much laughter than from the effort of the dance, if it could be called that.

Victor was almost manic, happy, eyes dancing, and it was infectious because Yuuri felt the same, a steady buzz beneath his skin, his body tingling. The Russian flung himself back onto the sofa, pulling Yuuri on top of him but making no move otherwise, just watching him, blue eyes half lidded between thick lashes, chest still rising and falling heavy, their hands interlaced.

“Tell me about Japan,” he whispered, letting his head fall back, resting it across the back of the sofa. “Tell me  _ something _ , anything, Yuuri.” He still smiled, though, and Yuuri straddled his lap comfortably as he launched into something, anything, as Victor had requested.

“My family runs a hot spring, in Hasetsu” he said. “It’s a lovely spot, the best in town.”

He told Victor about his family, his mother and her amazing cooking, his father and his terrible jokes. His sister. Minako—

“She was a ballerina, too,” he commented, because he had forgotten. “She runs a studio, now. I used to go there, when I was still figure skating. She was my instructor.”

“Minako,” Victor whispered, turning the name over in his mouth as if recalling a distant memory. “Okuka—” He stumbled over the name, trailing off, looking mildly embarrassed at his struggle with it.

“Okukawa,” Yuuri finished. “You’ve heard of her?”

Victor laughed. “Small world, yes? I have. She won the  _ Benois de la Danse _ . She’s rather well known.”

It sounded right, though Yuuri suddenly couldn’t recall, so he nodded. “Small world,” he whispered in return. But not small enough a world that he and Victor had met before this, though he lived only one floor above the man.

Victor’s eyes moved back on him, intense. “You used to figure skate?” he said idly, thumb stroking across the back of Yuuri’s hand and he blushed, looking away.

“I used to, but we couldn’t afford—” He heaved out a sigh, pulling his hand away, pressing it to Victor’s heart instead, feeling his heartbeat too fast beneath his wiry chest. “The town was failing, and things were hard. It was a burden on my parents, even if they—” He stopped and couldn’t finish, sad at what could have been, suddenly overwhelmed with regrets.

“I’m sorry,” Victor murmured.

“That’s life,” Yuuri said, laughing softly with only a faint edge of hysteria to it. That was life, and this was life, too, counting down the days to the end. It felt surreal, as if he hadn’t long since accepted it but rather had long since given up caring.

He did care, but having Victor there made it easier not to dwell on it.

Victor sighed and pulled Yuuri down against him, arms coming up around him in what may have been a hug. Yuuri returned the motion, sliding hands between Victor and the sofa, curling against him. “I have regrets, too,” the man whispered into his shoulder, where he had buried his face. “I have so many regrets.”

“That’s life,” Yuuri echoed, numb.

“I know,” Victor said. “I know.”

Eventually they made it from the sofa and to the kitchen and to dinner, because it was gradually growing later, though it was hard to know for certain because Yuuri had no clocks around, had used his phone to check the time, mostly, but it still sat broken on the coffee table.

Victor cooked again, and he was good at it and seemed to enjoy it well enough, so Yuuri only helped where the man allowed, stepping around carefully on his feet, which hurt more after the brief dancing. Still, they ate standing up, plates in hand, both of them too tired of their vigil on the sofa to return there. And Yuuri didn’t have a kitchen table; he often only ate sitting at the sofa or standing at the counter as they did now.

Only usually he had Phichit there with him instead of Victor.

Dinner was the overcooked rice from the tupperware at the back of the fridge, and Victor had made some chicken, which was nice enough, too nice to be accompanied by the sticky congealed mess of rice, but Victor drowned his in soy sauce and barely touched it anyway.

Yuuri ate most of his, though, not really hungry but bored enough that the motion of eating was something to occupy the time.

An air of sadness from their previous conversation still hung over them as they ate and Victor’s fork shook in his hand and Yuuri just watched, equally as silent.

“Are you better?” he asked at last, when the silence was overwhelming, when he thought he might break down into sobs again.

Victor’s hand froze, and he looked up and his eyes were far heavier than they had been and Yuuri wondered if he’d slept at all since coming to stay with him in his apartment. “I’ll get there,” he said quietly. “Eventually.”

 

—

 

_ Ten days _ , and Yuuri was restless.

“It’s Christmas in a few days,” Victor said, his head in Yuuri’s lap, silver hair spread out around him like a halo. He seemed ill again, as he had a few days before, sweat beading across his forehead, face pale and porcelain.

Yuuri looked up from his book, some novel he’d filched from Phichit’s room that was the furthest thing from anything he’d ever want to read, but he was reading it anyway because both of them were bored to that point. He felt they should be doing something more, something exciting, but there they were on the sofa again, doing nothing of any importance as the moments counted down to the end, every minute wasted.

“It is, isn’t?” Yuuri had forgotten. He closed the book with a small snap, thankful to be done with it. “We should do something,” he suggested, stroking a hand thoughtfully through Victor’s hair.

Victor smiled up at him, wide and playful. “Maybe,” he murmured and he reached a hand up to stroke his thumb across the side of Yuuri’s face. “It’s my birthday, you know.”

And Yuuri grinned, sliding his hand over Victor’s, pressing his face into the touch, and he had never had a relationship before, but he thought this was what it was like: Victor and his soft touches and playful smiles and overabundance of charm. Victor spread out across his lap like a cat, long legs propped up on the arm of the sofa. It was disgustingly domestic, the two of them playing house across the last few days, as if the end wasn’t on its way.

_ Ten days _ .

“What? Christmas day?”

“Yes,” Victor said, “I’ll be twenty eight.”

Twenty eight, he’d seen life for twenty eight years and it wasn’t enough, it wasn’t  _ enough _ , and his voice said it all.

It was four more years than Yuuri had had.

And it wasn’t enough.

“We should definitely do something then,” Yuuri murmured, dropping his hand down, and Victor’s hand followed it. His smile was playful and charming as ever but his eyes were distant, sad. They were going through the motions, because it was what they had. “I have something in mind, actually.” He leaned down, one hand still buried in Victor’s hair and Victor knew what he meant and met him halfway, pressing their lips together into a rough kiss.

It was slow and unhurried, both of them twisted into awkward angles, both of them tired and fatigued to the bone, but Victor groaned a noise of assent into the kiss, shifting upwards to better bridge the gap.

By the time he squirreled himself properly into Yuuri’s lap, he was half hard and Victor was noticeably so through his sweatpants, pressing his hips into Yuuri’s, rolling slow and steady, until Yuuri was choking back a moan, letting Victor lead, as he had with their dance, with all the times before, because Victor had all the charm and the experience and the sex appeal.

“Yuuri,” he breathed through their kiss, lips barely brushing now, and his hands were buried in Yuuri’s hair, keeping him close, drawing him back in for kiss after kiss after kiss, until their lips were flushed and swollen. “Where have you been, Yuuri. All my life,  _ where have you been _ ?”

 

—

 

_ Eight days _ , and tomorrow was Christmas, and Yuuri stirred back to consciousness to see Victor already awake, head laid across his chest, fingers buried in the soft material of the shirt he’d fallen asleep in.

“Mmm,” Yuuri mumbled, half awake, “Happy birthday, Victor.”

Victor’s eyes danced and he smiled. “It snowed again last night,” he whispered, “It’s a white christmas,” and Yuuri knew the man knew because he had likely been up again most of the night, long after Yuuri had finally fallen asleep. And he lifted his head to meet his eyes and Yuuri could see the physical proof in the lines of his face, in the dark purpling around his eyes. “We should go out,” he continued. “We could build a snowman?”

Yuuri snorted, shuffling upright, and Victor followed gracefully, hair everywhere, the very picture of rumpled. “Is there even enough snow for that?” he asked, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He moved for his glasses, but Victor was already pushing them into his hands.

“There’s plenty, trust me,” he said slyly. “It’ll be  _ fun _ .” And that was a nice word to hear: fun.

“Sure,” Yuuri said, pulling himself from the bed. “It’s your birthday, after all. Whatever you want.”

Yuuri bundled up as Victor sat on the edge of his bed and watched. He had boots and a heavy jacket and gloves, the works, but he only put on the barest amount he’d need against the chill, not at all concerned about the cold outside with how cold it was in the apartment all day.

Victor took his hand as they finally stepped out and into the hallway, pulling him afterward in the wake of Yuuri’s trepidation. And the hallway was as desolate as always, with it’s one flickering light and the faint buzz of fluorescents overhead, the stale smell of paint and old walls.

“We’ll need to go by my apartment,” Victor said, tugging him along and down the stairs. “My things are there, for this type of weather.”

Victor’s apartment proved to be nicer than his, though an exact replica of the floorplan. The paint on the walls was fresher, the floors newer and better kept. And the furniture was nice, though plain, but it reeked of Victor, his entire apartment, and Yuuri suddenly felt self conscious that he had asked Victor to stay with  _ him _ and leave the nicer place behind.

Victor had given up more comfort than he had to offer to stay with him.

A bookshelf by the door was adorned with photos and Yuuri took the time to look them over as Victor disappeared down a hallway and into what must have been his bedroom. They were all of them of Victor: Victor and a small poodle, tongue lolling from the side of it’s mouth, Victor dressed in bright colors, which billowed out about him,  _ en pointe _ , one leg raised high, Victor in a warm jacket, arm thrown around the shoulders of an angry looking blonde boy. And then awards, spread across the spaces between the photos, between books.

The apartment was lived in in a way similar to Yuuri’s, despite the stark differences. A pair of ballet shoes tossed into one corner, a glass left on the coffee table, half full of water, a bottle of pills spilled across the kitchen counter that Yuuri carefully avoided thinking about, a smattering of broken glass across the kitchen floor that spoke of anger and terror, the stringent scent of alcohol and sadness and anguish.

_ We all cope in our own way _ , Yuuri remembered, and Victor was no different than him.

Victor returned and mentioned none of those things, still smiling his playful smile but adorned in a heavier jacket and gloves and boots.

And then they went downstairs, Victor’s apartment forgotten. The way down was through the same old stairwell that smelled of stale smoke, and past apartments that all felt empty, a door open here and there with no one inside, the privacy of the previous lives of it’s occupants on full display.

And the street was empty, alarmingly so, an abandoned car here and there, snowed in. And the street was beautiful with untouched snow, not a footprint anywhere as far as the eye could see, pristine and bright and glowing. Victor was abuzz beside him and set off, boots crunching through the snow. And before Yuuri could fully process the scene before him—Victor beautiful and twirling through the snow, graceful and elegant as always despite the cumberance beneath his feet—a snowball collided with the side of his head.

Yuuri blinked, cold snow slipping down the side of his face, cold moisture slipping down his neck and beneath his jacket, and it was awful. He hadn’t even been aware of Victor throwing it, so entranced with everything around him, and he glared at the man, who laughed, delighted at himself.

Another snowball followed and then Yuuri threw his own, forming them with gloveless hands, which turned pink and trembling beneath the onslaught of cold and ice. But it was worth it, because his snowballs formed faster and harder and he threw them with such force that it winded Victor as he staggered across the landscape, ducking behind a car here, a corner there.

It was amazing, the air fresh and crisp, the sky bright and blue, he and Victor laughing as if nothing in the world were wrong.

(but the world was still wrong, everything was wrong, but they let themselves forget if only for the moment)

And it was nice, Victor finally collapsing into the snow, arms and legs spread. Yuuri stood over him, smiling.

“Are you going to make a snow angel?” he asked and Victor shook his head, hair catching in the snow and the ice, damp and clumped and tangled.

“Of course not,” he said, his breath a soft cloud in the air. “You’ve defeated me Yuuri, I’ve been defeated, and on my birthday of all days, how cruel of you.” He grinned, lopsided and cute and Yuuri’s heart melted as he dropped into the snow next to him, snow soaking his pants to the bone. He was cold, so cold, but he couldn’t find it in himself to care, not now, not here with Victor and the beauty of a soon to be dead world and the happiness that they had somehow found together.

Yuuri leaned down and kissed him and his lips were chapped and cold, his cheeks, his ears, his nose all tinged red from the frigid air. “Happy birthday,” he murmured against the kiss, and then he pulled away and stood, offering his hand to Victor, who took and it and allowed himself to be pulled up.

Then the moment passed, because Yuuri turned and noticed for the first time the graffiti on the buildings around them, the graffiti across their own building,  _ I’m scared _ in bright yellow spray paint across old, dirty brick and Yuuri’s heart sank fast.

Yuuri  _ was  _ scared and the terror was a vice grip on his heart.

Beside him Victor fell silent, gloved hand reaching out to grab Yuuri’s. The laughter had come to an abrupt halt, and Victor pulled at him, bringing him into his arms, hugging him close. He was soaked from head to foot in snow and it made Yuuri all the colder but he didn’t pull away, and he somehow didn’t cry.

There wasn’t enough time for that, there wasn’t enough time for their sadness.

Victor dragged him inside and back up to his shoddy apartment, which felt all the worse now after Victor’s, but Yuuri had no desire to be there with it’s smattering of unhappiness when his own place was now cozy with the two of them, lived in with their clothes scattered about, dishes in the sink.

They stripped their cold and wet clothes off at the door, stumbling towards the shower because the whole place was cold but the water from the tap would be warm and hot and Yuuri needed Victor’s touch, in the wake of what he’d seen, needed to melt away the horrors beneath hot water and sex.

Victor kissed him first this time, pushing him against the cracked tile wall of the shower, pinning him there, hungry in his ferocity. They were starving, both of them, and Victor painted it across his skin in kisses, leaving a trail of warmth as finally the water began to turn cool, forcing them from the shower and into the bedroom, where Victor laid himself down, pulling Yuuri on top of him.

And the day was wasted that way, but hardly wasted because Yuuri had Victor and Victor had Yuuri, and together they had something.

Afterwards Victor disappeared as Yuuri pulled clean and dry clothes on, and when he returned, finding Yuuri now in the kitchen, he came bearing bottles, precariously holding them in his arms.

“What’s this?” he asked as Victor scattered them about the counters. He plucked one up, reading the label. “Vodka? You want to drink?”

And Victor gave him a look, waving his hand dismissively. “Yes to drinking, no to the vodka, I just grabbed that since I was in my apartment.” He reached out and pulled one bottle aside, plucking the vodka from Yuuri and pressing it into his hands instead. It was wine, an elegant bottle burnished deep purple, with an equally fancy label, wax sealing the cork closed.

“This looks expensive,” he said and Victor grinned, pressing a finger to his mouth in delight.

“It  _ is _ ,” he said. “And it was a gift. I’ve been saving it for something special. It’s merlot, my favorite.”

Yuuri frowned, setting it aside. “Today is hardly special,” he said and Victor looked horrified, gasping dramatically, and Yuuri realized he had forgotten himself and he rolled his eyes at the reaction.

“Today is plenty special!” Victor exclaimed, setting about the bottle, peeling back the wax with a practiced motion. “It’s my birthday, after all. And it’s Christmas,” and they had too little days left for this one not to be especially special, but Victor didn’t say that though Yuuri knew they were both thinking it. It was his birthday, his  _ last _ birthday. And it was Christmas, the very last Christmas. “Hmm, do you have a corkscrew?” He rifled through drawers with hardly a thought, brow furrowed.

“No,” Yuuri said, because he was hardly a wine drinker; the fanciest thing he owned was a blender, which more often than not sat tucked into a cabinet, unused.

Victor sighed and grabbed up a small knife, pressing it down the side of the cork with a quick motion, his hand deft and steady (where it had been so unsteady lately,) and Yuuri watched and thought there was no end to the hidden depths of the man, who stood there barefoot, in ill fitting clothing, rumpled, yet stood opening a bottle of wine that Yuuri suspected was worth more than he made in a month.

The cork popped off with a simple motion, and Yuuri could smell it’s fragrance drifting out, earthy and aromatic. Victor pulled cups from another cabinet and poured them each a glass, and it was hilarious to be drinking expensive wine out of Yuuri’s set of plastic cups. “And the vodka,” Victor said, handing over Yuuri’s cup, “Is for when this doesn’t do the trick.”

And Yuuri understood well enough. They weren’t going to drink, they were going to  _ drink _ .

He downed the wine quickly enough, because it wasn’t all that great for it’s expense, and Victor hardly nursed it, either, making a face. “Ahh, of course it’s a disappointment,” he chuckled. “These things always are, when so much money is put into trying to make them special.”

And it was a gorgeous metaphor for the day, special but cheapened by the effort to make it special when everyday henceforth would be as special as the last, one last day, one  _ less _ day, special but spent doing not much of anything as the clock ticked down to their doom.

And that was life now.

Yuuri was tipsy by the end of the second glass, ahead of Victor, who gladly poured him the last of it and started on the vodka himself, mixing it with something or other he pulled from the fridge, something likely from his own apartment because Yuuri hardly kept the kind of things one mixed with alcohol to make it tolerable.

It was nice and the feeling was a bubble of warmth within him as he finally made it to the couch, falling onto it, nearly sloshing his glass, which Victor plucked from his hands before he could paint the couch purple-red with it. “Thanks,” he giggled and it was weird, to giggle, and Victor handed him his drink back, settling in next to him.

“ Victor,” he said breathily, falling into him, and Victor smiled his own tipsy smile. “Victor, you’re wonderful and you’re so pretty. You’re the prettiest.”

Victor’s laugh was a symphony, delicate but bright and Yuuri felt warm, so very warm, as he snuggled up beside him. And he was maybe approaching drunk and maybe somewhere closer to acceptance of their situation than he had been before. It felt real but it felt more as if it didn’t matter. “We all die,” he whispered, and Victor stiffened beside him, arm tense where he had thrown it around Yuuri’s shoulder. “We’re just going to die sooner.”

He could no longer see Victor’s face with how he was slouched, but he could see the way his hand tightened around his drink.

“And maybe,” he continued, staggering over his words. “Maybe—Maybe this is a blessing, to know it's coming.” He drew in a ragged breath but he wasn’t sad, he wasn’t. “Now we can use our time, instead of wasting it.”

Victor made a small noise he couldn’t quite put meaning to, but he relaxed a bit and Yuuri liked that, pressed himself closer into the man. And his drink was gone, he realized as he curled fingers against the man’s chest, Victor must have taken it from him.

“I regret not meeting you sooner, Yuuri,” Victor said softly and Yuuri suddenly found his eyes damp, but he wasn’t sad.

“I have so many regrets,” Yuuri whispered, and Victor turned, catching his chin in long slender fingers, raising his head up to bring their faces close, meeting his eyes.

“None of that matters, now,” Victor told him. “There will always be regrets. That’s life.”

Yuuri heaved out a sigh. “I know,” he murmured. “I know. But I wasn’t happy, and I regret not letting myself be happy.”

“I wasn’t happy either,” Victor echoed. “I hated my career, I hate it here, in the states, and I only ever wanted to go home, to Russia” His own voice had a tilt to it that told Yuuri he was in much the same state as him, now. “But I couldn’t go back, because my parents are there, and because it wasn’t safe, and—” He laughed, suddenly, and it was so sudden against the somber note of his voice that Yuuri frowned, confused. “I hate my hair,” he said, reaching up and tangling his finger in it. “I hate it, I’ve hated it for so long, but I had to look the part, always, if I wanted roles, and I—”

Yuuri reached up and dragged his own hands through Victor’s hair, suddenly guilty with how much he loved it.

“I haven’t been allowed agency over myself in so long,” Victor whispered. “I haven’t been able to be who I wanted to be.”

“Are you who you want to be now?” Yuuri asked, dropping his hand back to Victor’s chest, to his heart, which raced in his chest.

“Yes,” Victor breathed. “Yes, finally.”

And the next morning,  _ seven days _ , Yuuri woke to Victor gone, and he stumbled from his bed, hungover and achy and  _ tired _ , and yes, he had regrets, but in his early morning grogginess all of those regrets were drinking so much the night before.

He found Victor in the kitchen, leaning against the counter, lost in thought and eyes on the ceiling, mug of something steaming drifting the floral scent of chocolate his way. And Yuuri’s breath caught in his throat because Victor’s hair—

“It’s gone,” he whispered, standing in the entryway to the kitchen, and Victor started noticeably, looking over at him. He reached up a shaking hand and combed his fingers through it, and strands fell free. It was short with a messy fringe over one eye. “You cut it off.”

Victor smiled and took a sip of his drink. “I did,” he said, and he sounded free and so so relieved.

Yuuri stepped over and slotted himself between Victor’s legs, reaching up and brushing the fringe of hair back. Victor smiled wider and dropped his free hand down to catch Yuuri’s hip, pulling him properly against him. “It’s a bit messy,” Yuuri said, but he smiled as well.

The man shrugged and held out his mug for Yuuri to take. He sniffed it and it smelled of sweet and decadence; Yuuri took a sip and it was bland as water. He made a face. “Is this supposed to be hot chocolate?” he asked, bewildered and Victor laughed.

“I suppose so,” he told him, taking the mug back, moving it slowly so that the liquid swirled around the cup. “Found a packet buried at the back of your pantry. I think it’s out of date.”

“Of course it is,” Yuuri murmured, sliding around to lean against the counter next to Victor, dragging a hand through his own, messy hair.

The stood there in silence, Yuuri’s feet throbbing, though the pain was now a far cry from what it had been the first few days, Victor taking the occasional sip of his ‘hot chocolate,’ both of them lost to their own thoughts.

“You know,” Victor said, “The power probably won’t be on much longer.” And it was their first proper mention of the inevitable in days, Victor’s gaze on the fluorescent light in his kitchen. “And the water will likely go out soon.”

Did it matter, Yuuri thought, did it really matter?

It did, and they spent the day foraging for containers to store water in (tupperware with loose fitting lids; the vodka bottle—Victor sadly poured the last of it down the drain; the empty wine bottle—an expensive vintage now resolved to holding water; every large bowl he could find in his cabinet) until the counters were littered with a storage of water.

It looked positively ridiculous, but they had seven days,  _ seven days _ , and the water could go out at any time, and they might both die of dehydration before the actual end.

Victor was cheerful the whole time, as if preparing for the end of the world was something he did all the time. He hummed as he neatly spread out the containers, sang a Russian lullaby to Yuuri, one from his childhood.

And then they did inventory, as Victor called it, assessing what food they had left, what should be held off for eating once the power was out (canned soup, packs of instant ramen, dry cereal) and what they should eat sooner (the tupperware of rice, barely good, the last few eggs.)

“I think we’ll make it,” Victor said at last, looking out over the kitchen, now a mess of bottles and tupperware and tin cans.

And it was funny, because they weren’t really going to make it at all.

And the next day, the electricity wasn’t working when they woke up.  _ Six _ days and it was the home stretch, but the water worked, at least. And the two of them spent the day huddled beneath too many blankets, because if his apartment had been cold before, it was slowly getting colder, frigid now where it had only been chilly before.

But Victor had retained his cheerful facade, entertaining Yuuri with Russian jokes that translated poorly into English, and Yuuri did the same, vice versa, teaching him phrases in Japanese that Victor butchered in his attempts at repeating them, losing the finesse of the language in his accent. But Yuuri did just as poorly with Russian, and they laughed.

And then,  _ four days _ , he turned on the water and it ran until it fizzled, pipes clanking noisily. And Victor was no longer cheerful, had turned somber and sad, fake smiles dropping from his face the moment he thought Yuuri wasn’t looking.

By now the apartment was as cold as it was outside, and they walked about in layers of sweaters, eating cold soup for breakfast, and crunching at hard instant noodles for dinner. And Yuuri found himself exhausted with thinking of the days, of counting down the moments, the minutes, the hours, that he had left. That  _ they _ had left. Together.

And then,  _ three days _ , and Yuuri woke from his spot on the sofa to see the fuzzy outline of Victor at the door. He frowned as he fumbled for his glasses, calling out to him, and Victor froze as he finally came into focus. “Where are you— Where are you going?” he asked, throat tight.

Victor didn’t spare him a glance, stood with his back to him, hand curled around the door knob. “To the roof,” he whispered quietly, and Yuuri’s heart skipped a beat and he scrambled from his nest of blankets and into the cold chill.

“Victor,” he said, almost pleading. “Victor—” He let out a long breath, curling cold fingers into the hem of his shirt. “Are you going to—”

Victor turned to look at him, then, and he had been crying, Yuuri could tell, his eyes red ringed and swollen, tears flushed from long shed tears. He hid it behind a smile. “Come with me?” he whispered, and Yuuri slipped on his shoes and stumbled over to him, snatching up his wrist before he could make it out of the door.

“Victor,” he hissed, angry, squeezing his thin wrist hard enough it must have hurt him. “Please, tell me you’re not going to jump.”

Victor looked at him as if he himself didn’t know the answer to that question, but at long last he dropped the facade, let the fake smile that never reached his eyes fall from his face. “I’m not going to,” he said softly, and Yuuri followed him from the apartment.

They held hands as they ascended the stairs, stepping out into bright sunshine. It was strangely warm, and the snow had long since melted, leaving puddles all over the roof. And Matilda burned a bright spot above them, visible in the early morning, hanging in the sky like a second sun. Their death, smiling down at them.

Suddenly jumping seemed appealing. He squeezed Victor’s hand tight, instead, the man brushing his thumb gently over Yuuri’s knuckles. And Yuuri didn’t doubt for a moment that Victor had intended to jump, if he had come up alone. Because they were both of them selfish, and they deserved to be.

Victor cried when they went back down, curling beneath piles of blankets in his bed, and Yuuri let him curl against him, crying as well, and they spent too much of their final moments that way, sobbing and shaking and praying to  _ whatever _ that this wasn’t really it.

But it had long since passed the bad joke territory. It was real.

But they had each other, in those final moments. They had a friend, for the end, and Yuuri had never been so thankful for anything in his entire life, for Victor.

And the tears that night became tears the next night, with barely a day left, if even, because they didn’t know, had no timeframe for impact. The broadcast had shut off long before that had come up, but it would be soon, it would be so soon, and Yuuri curled up next to Victor, sobbing, hysterical, at last, because that was it. This was it.

“Shh,” Victor whispered, hand combing through Yuuri’s hair, which fell messy and too long into his eyes. He trembled against Victor’s chest, hands curled into his shirt, eyes dampening the material. And his heart raced, because this was it, this was  _ it _ . He was going to die. No more mornings, no more nights. Zero days.

“I don’t— I don’t wanna die,” he gasped out, voice cracking. “I don’t wanna—”

“Shh,” Victor murmured again, pulling Yuuri closer, curling around him. “I’m here, and—” He drew a ragged breath that shuddered through his chest and against Yuuri’s face. “And I’ll be here when you wake up. I’ll— I’ll be here.”

And Yuuri knew Victor was crying his own tears, could feel the way the man shook, the way his heart beat a staccato against him, where his face was pressed against his chest.

“Promise me,” Yuuri whispered. “ _ Promise _ me.”

“I promise,” Victor choked out, arms tightening around him. “I promise, Yuuri.”

And then Yuuri closed his eyes.


	2. All My Days

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He only met Yuri after their sentence had been set. They were all going to die, but at least Otabek got to die alongside Yuri.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was originally a standalone companion fic, so if you've read this already I apologize. I made the decision to combine them, as it didn't seem worth keeping them separate given how tied into one another they are. Enjoy.

He'd been away from his bike maybe ten minutes and, circumstances considered, Otabek wasn't surprised to see someone already trying to steal it. It was expected, even.

He stopped where he was, plastic bag dangling in one hand, and sighed out a soft laugh. It was some blonde, dressed in clashing leather and tiger print, sitting on the bike and bent over the bars as he fumbled with wires in what Otabek decided was a terrible attempt to hotwire it. The man looked up when he heard him, his sweep of blond hair tumbling about his shoulders. He didn’t look the least bit surprised that he’d been caught.

Otabek gave him a deadpan stare. “You have no idea how to steal a bike, do you?”

The blond shrugged. “Not like I could google it. But I figured it was worth an attempt.” He dropped the wires and leaned back. His shirt tightened against his lean torso and Otabek swept his eyes across him. “It’s a nice bike.”

“Thank you,” Otabek answered, swinging the bag in his hands. He’d saved for a year to be able to afford it. At the time, it had been absolutely worth it. Now it was worthless. Everything was worthless. He glanced about the alley he’d parked it in; it was filthy with scattered trash and broken glass, just as many of the other streets of London now were. His bike looked pristine amongst it all. “It’s not got much gas in it,” he added after a moment, “If you were hoping to make it out of the city.”

Otabek had himself considered it, but the only place he had to be,  _ wanted _ to be, was in the mainland. The chunnel had been overcrowded day one, and by day two was blocked with pile ups and abandoned cars. There was no making it out of Britain. And there was no sense leaving London.

He had come to terms with it already.

The man on his bike shrugged. “Was going to joyride,” he told him. “I thought it might be fun. Not like there’s much else to do.”

Otabek couldn’t disagree. The world was ending and there wasn’t much to do in the dying days. He was as bored as the blond was. It had been a long week of itching in his skin, pacing around his flat, sleeping for far too long.

“And are you really one to judge?” he continued, eyeing the bag in his hands. “You were just looting, after all.” 

Otabek moved the bag from one hand to another. The pharmacy had been a trainwreck of scattered pills and broken glass. Hardly much left to loot, but he  _ had _ been looting. He didn’t try to deny it. “You caught me,” he deadpanned.

The man grinned and it made his blue eyes dance. His expression, accompanied by his leopard print shirt, made him look wild. Otabek liked it. He looked alive when all they were doing was dying. “Do you want to fuck?” he asked and Otabek choked on his breath.

“Do I want to—” he echoed, swallowing. “You don’t even know my name.”

The man shrugged. “The world is ending. Does it matter?”

Not really, Otabek supposed. Not much mattered anymore. He looked the man over, stretched out as he was, tight jeans and thin legs wrapped around the leather seat. He leaned forward, folding his arms across the handlebars. Otabek could imagine him bent over just like that across his bed.

“Okay,” he said at last.

 

His flat was barely affordable, but he made do. His landlord had been a kind woman who never questioned him when he told her he needed a few extra days to make rent. She’d left day one, said she was heading out to the countryside to be with her family. He’d offered her his bike, but she’d only laughed and shook her head. “Can you imagine me, on a motorbike?” she’d said. “I’ll make do.” She’d left him with free reign of the entire place, and her unit on the bottom floor. And her full pantry and fridge. She invited him down often for brunch and for supper so he knew his way around well enough.

The blond squeezed his waist tight the whole ride back, breathless against the wind torn up from the speed they went on his bike. Otabek couldn’t really say he was ever an adrenaline junkie, but the blond absolutely was, laughing excitedly in his ear the faster they went. “Faster!” he cried into the wind. So Otabek obliged him, throttling far over the speed limit through the mostly empty streets.

There were no cops to pull him over. None that gave enough of a damn, at least. And what did it matter if they did? Nothing really mattered anymore except the thrum of the bike between his legs and the blond clinging to his back.

Otabek had had the foresight to lock the door before he left, a good thing considering there were apparently bike thieves roaming about. He was relieved to find it still locked as he had left it.

“Nice place,” the blonde said, stretching as they finally stepped into his flat. He shed his jacket before Otabek could even close the door, tossing it onto his beat up sofa. The muscles in his back rippled as he shrugged off his shirt next. He was fit as he was lean. He looked athletic.

He made only a gentle dip in Otabek’s unmade bed as he settled onto it, pale skin flush against the dark sheets. He curled his hands in them, knees splayed beneath him. “Well?”

“Otabek.”

He frowned. “Excuse me?”

Otabek stepped towards him, shrugging out of his own jacket. “My name. It’s Otabek.” Otabek wasn’t unfamiliar with trists with virtual strangers, but it still seemed right to introduce himself.

“Oh. Mine is Yuri.”

“Nice to meet you, Yuri.”

Yuri grinned. “Well? Are you going to fuck me or what?”

 

Yuri was indeed as pretty pressed into Otabek’s bed as he had been sprawled across his motorcycle. He was as wild as the taunt of his blue eyes and he embodied the way he had sounded when he’d asked a stranger if he wanted to fuck.

Every soft murmur against pale skin, “Do you need me to go slow?” was met with an angry noise and a rough roll of hips back against his own, “Fuck no, go  _ faster _ .”

Faster, like Yuri had begged him to go on his motorcycle.

 

Yuri spread himself across his bed, later, tangled himself into his sheets like he owned them, like he belonged there. Otabek stood nude in his kitchen, lighting a cigarette and looking out at him.

“You smoke?” he asked, pulling himself upright. His hair was a mess, tousled but somehow still delicate. Otabek met his eyes through the haze of smoke drifting into the space in front of him.

He shrugged. “Quit a while ago, didn’t seem a bad time to start back up.”

Yuri crinkled his nose and dragged himself from the bed, taking the sheets with him, draping them about his lithe body. He wore them like Adonis. Everything seemed to suit him: the fall of the white cloth, the sweep of his blonde hair, the way he strode over as if floating, feet hidden beneath the curtain of his new attire.

He was a fan of draping himself places, it seemed, because he leaned onto the counter and propped himself up on his elbow with his chin nestled into his palm. Otabek considered him, taking a drag of his cigarette.

“Bad habit,” Yuri drawled, tapping his fingers against the counter with his free hand. “But I don’t suppose it matters. There are no consequences to anything anymore.”

Otabek wanted to tell him that there  _ were _ . If you were a believer, then in your mind there were still consequences. Not all of the devout stopped being devout just because their doom was suddenly more eminent.

But no, there weren’t any true consequences to anything now, and Yuri didn’t strike him as the religious type.

“Where are you from?” Yuri asked and Otabek frowned, sending a flicker of ashes into the sink.

“Czechia” he told him.

Yuri righted himself and stretched. “Russia,” he said. Otabek had figured as much. The man couldn’t have been in London very long, given the thickness of his accent.

They were two people stranded too far from home with nowhere to be.

“You can stay.”

Yuri frowned, looking his way.

Otabek sighed and pressed the head of his cigarette into the damp of the sink. “I mean, if you want to.”

Yuri looked around, padding from the kitchen and into the main room. “I think one of my neighbors killed themselves,” he said at last.

Otabek choked on the breath he was taking. The acrid taste of smoke hung on his tongue.

Yuri continued as if it was the most casual thing in the world to talk about. “There’s been this  _ smell _ , in the hallway of my complex, you know?”

Otabek had walked to school as a child, and a cat had once been hit and killed alongside the road he walked down. It had stayed there for over a week, and the smell—It was a smell that  _ lingered _ , touched everything around it with the dank odor of rot and decomposition.

How long had it been since the news broke? Four days? Five? Maybe more. All of his first few days had been spent angry, enraged, violent. He’d broken everything in sight and had slowly pieced his life back together only in the last day or so.

He curled his hand into a loose fist, stretching the scabby remnants along his knuckles.

“Yeah,” Yuri said at last, plopping himself back onto the bed. “I think I’ll stay, sure.”

 

_ Staying  _ quickly became something more like taking over the place. Yuri wore his clothes and stole his sheets and used his dishes, his toothbrush, his hairbrush. Otabek couldn’t be bothered enough to care.

Yuri, he decided, was an enigma.

He consumed his flat like he had been there all along.

 

“What did you do?” Yuri asked. “Before this.” They were sprawled in the bed, because that’s where they most often found themselves. Yuri gestured about, as if the motion of his arms could convey what he meant by ‘this’. It didn’t, but Otabek when what he meant nonetheless.

Before Matilda, the asteroid heading their way. Before an impending end and a sudden stop to days spent stressed about making rent and a fast transition into days spent counting down, frantic, scrabbling desperation to  _ survive _ .

Otabek had once read somewhere that humanity endured. Humanity wouldn’t endure this. He would die, Yuri would die, his sister his mother his father—Everyone.

Dead.

He drew in a ragged breath and pushed it from his mind. That had been his method of coping so far. Just don’t think about it. “Music,” he said. “I was a DJ.”

Yuri looked the type of person who might frequent the kind of clubs he played at. His reaction to the news was a small smirk and a “ _ Cool _ .”

“And you?”

Yuri frowned, a tight lipped pout that Otabek was certain he had trademarked. “Art student,” he said at last. Otabek didn’t know if it was true or not, because there was so much about Yuri that felt caught somewhere between manufactured and surreal.

And of course, Otabek would never really  _ know _ . But they were comfortable like this.

Denial was a drug they both partook in.

 

“Is there anything you’ve ever  _ really _ wanted to do?” Yuri asked. He was leaned against the counter, elbows braced, loose shirt hanging on his frame. Otabek was busy beside him, making tea. His flat was becoming increasingly cold and damp, just as it was outside, and the warmth of the mug in his hand as he picked it up was a pleasant, much needed luxury.

“I wonder when the power will go out,” Otabek mused, ignoring Yuri’s question. He didn’t think he could answer it. Every time the thought occurred to him, it staggered him, caught in his throat until he wanted to heave it out and  _ scream _ .

Everything. Otabek had wanted to do  _ everything _ . Yet here he stood, making tea in his drafty flat, with a man who he’d only just met and just fucked.

Yuri regarded him with crisp blue eyes and took the offered mug. He still wanted an answer. When it didn’t come Yuri curled his pretty mouth into a frown.

“I only mean, there are plenty of things to be done, you know? Things that used to have consequences.”  _ But don’t anymore _ , left hanging in the air, unsaid.

Otabek took a sip of his tea. It was scalding and left an unpleasant tingle on his tongue. “You mean like stealing motorcycles?”

Yuri pulled himself away from the counter dramatically, tea sloshing over the sides of his mug. “Yeah, sure, like that,” he decided, rolling his eyes. “ _ You _ were looting.”

Otabek shrugged. “I can’t say I’ve really put much thought to it,” he told the blond. And now, even thinking about it for the first time, he couldn’t say there  _ was _ anything. They were dying. He was content enough to ride it out in his flat. With Yuri, if he wanted to keep hanging around. “What about you?”

Yuri sighed and it was as dramatic as his posture, albeit equal parts thoughtful. He didn’t answer the question. Perhaps, despite posing it, he was really only as eager to discuss the topic as Otabek himself was. “Let’s go out and do something.”

There it was. Yuri was restless.

He set his mug down with a loud clink. He hadn’t even touched it and now it would grow cold on his countertop. Otabek didn’t move, just watched him and continued on his own tea. “Okay,” he said. “What do you want to do?”

Yuri stepped from the kitchen without giving an immediate response. Otabek watched him but didn’t follow. “Doesn’t matter,” Yuri finally called out. He was rifling through clothes piled along the floor, deciding what to wear.

He’d been stealing Otabek’s clothes, all of it a few sizes too big, and yet he always found a way to appear stylish. The world was ending, and he still cared about how he looked, how he presented himself. Otabek hadn’t even been brushing his hair.

“I just want to get out, is all.”

 

It was as cold as expected when they stepped outside, decked in clothes fitting of the weather. Yuri stopped on the stoop, gaze lifting to the sky. It was awash in shades of gray and white. “It’s going to snow,” Yuri said and Otabek had to agree. They were snow clouds, without a doubt.

“Where to?” Otabek asked, stepping out into the street. It was a mess; trash littered and collected in the gutters, a few abandoned vehicles stood here and there. He could hear a wail in the distance and he spotted someone leaned against a building not too far away.

“I have a thought, actually.” Yuri started for his bike and Otabek frowned. “You said there’s not much gas.” Yuri slid a hand across the leather seat.

In all honesty, Otabek was surprised to see it still where he’d left it, though he supposed it was probably too much of an inconvenience to steal.

“I have enough to get around the city, I think.”

Yuri grinned. “Good, get on. There’s somewhere I want to go.”

Otabek didn’t ask. He’d brought his keys, because he’d locked his flat, and he stepped over and slung a leg over, starting the engine. It cut loud through the chilly air. The off and on wailing in the distance stopped. It dissolved into something quieter, more personal. Whoever it was had realized they weren’t alone and decided they wanted some semblance of privacy.

Yuri slid behind him, pressing his solid weight against his back, curling deft hands around him. “I want it to be a surprise. I’ll direct you.”

And of course, Yuri was bad at directions. Too many times Otabek had to slide to a stop and turn around, take a turn Yuri had too late told him to.

He wasn’t certain what he expected or where he expected to end up, but the rink looming in front of them was far from it. Yuri smiled and beelined for the door. Otabek followed, shoving his hands in his pockets. He chanced one last, fond look at his bike as he settled in at the door, in the off chance he never saw it again.

Yuri had keys in his hands and he unlocked the door and Otabek decided now was finally the time to ask questions. “You have keys,” he noted.

Yuri dragged him in and cooler air washed over them, the dim lighting of the rink settled over them. “Well, yeah. I rent time at the rink.” He glanced over at Otabek, pinching his brow. “I’m a figure skater,” he explained, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world and Otabek was silly for not realizing it.

“You said you were an art student,” Otabek said.

Yuri snorted and headed for what Otabek assumed were locker rooms. “I can be both.”

Yeah, that much was true enough. Yuri was a lot of things. He was endless surprises and sly smiles and angelic blue eyes.

Otabek stood by while Yuri rifled through what could only be his locker and pulled skates from it. He slipped them on as if they were an extension of his body and, watching him work the laces up, Otabek decided they probably were.

“The ice is going to be shit,” Yuri told him as they finally reached the rink, him all skated up and Otabek fully interested, now. “No upkeep. How long has it been now?”

He shifted uncomfortably, glancing up at the light streaming in from the windows above them. He hadn’t been keeping track of time. The thought of doing so tore at him. “I don’t know.”

Yuri shrugged and slipped the guards from his skates and, carefully, stepped out to test the ice. “ _ Terrible, _ ” he declared. He glided out anyway, as if he were born of the ice, as if he were shaped specifically to do exactly what he was doing now. “I won gold at the Grand Prix this year.”

“Did you?” Otabek wasn’t at all surprised, though he knew next to nothing about figure skating.

Yuri spun in a circle, legs wide, his stance sending him slowly round. “Yeah. Was only a month ago, actually.” He stilled and then  _ moved _ and Otabek suddenly realized he hadn’t truly been moving before. He crossed the ice and to the barrier and then swept fast around the edges. Then he jumped and he  _ flew.  _ Four rotations, if Otabek had counted correctly. “It’s funny,” Yuri called out, now moving once more in a slow circle. “If the timing had been different, just a week or so earlier, I would still be in Montreal right now.”

“You wouldn’t have met me,” Otabek said softly. Yuri heard it and he stopped to face him, blue eyes shining even so far across the rink as he was.

“Yeah, I suppose that’s true.” Yuri dropped it fast, gliding over slowly. “You can join me, there are plenty of skates.” He nodded towards a far corner, where a kiosk was set up.

Otabek definitely thought about it, eyes following the smooth lines Yuri had cut across the ice. “I think I’ll pass,” he decided. It felt wrong to interrupt the moment. Yuri had come here for a reason.

Whatever answer Yuri had been expecting didn’t seem to matter. “Cool,” he said.

He skated something beautiful, his body lithe for a reason, his hair a masterpiece as it moved with him. Maybe that was why he kept it long, Maybe because it made him look like an angel on the ice.

It must have been a routine that he skated, because the jumps were choreographed and he skated to unheard music, moved to cues that were only there in the spirit of the music he must have originally skated this piece to.

Still, it was a masterpiece. Otabek leaned against the dasher board and watched until Yuri stopped, chest rising and falling, body trembling, falling into stiff, dizzy movements as he rose up from a spin. “Terrible!” Yuri called out into the cool air.

It wasn’t terrible. Otabek didn’t tell him that; Yuri had come for a reason not for any shape of input.

 

Later, when they pulled back to Otabek’s flat, Yuri told him it had been his free skate, the one that had won him his most recent gold. “Terrible,” he said again. He sounded mournful this time. “I’m just too tired to—It doesn’t matter, I suppose, if I’m good or if I’m bad. I think I liked that this time.” Yuri floated his way to the door, falling into a movement similar to what he had had in the ice. “It’s nice. The world can’t judge me now.”

 

Otabek fucked him gentle, later, though Yuri pressed him for something more. There was no time in the world left, but it felt right to take the time to treat Yuri differently than he wanted to and had resigned himself to being treated. Something different. And anyway, he didn’t complain as he came.

 

It never ended up snowing.

 

Yuri rifled through Otabek’s things as he slept, and he woke to Yuri stretched out beside him, notebook in hand, pen poised between long fingers. “You’re drawing,” Otabek mumbled, pressing his face against the lean plane of Yuri’s side.

“Mmm,” Yuri managed in return. The scritch scratch Otabek had woken to returned. “Not my prefered medium, but this is good enough I guess.” He said it with humourous judgement. It was a shitty notebook, lined even, and it was a shitty pen, probably running low on ink.

It didn’t stop Yuri from making art and he held the book up when he was done, giving Otabek a glance of his work. A rough rendering of buildings, sad and decrepit. As if aged beyond what they were, an image, Otabek realized, of the street below. He took it from Yuri, but only because the book was offered to him.

“If only we died, and the rest of the world lived.” Yuri spun the pen in his fingers. Badly, because it fell and scattered to the floor. He made no move to get it. “The world won’t keep spinning, there won’t be a world. No one can survive, there’s not a chance in hell. There’s not a hope.”

Otabek didn’t speak, but he felt the weight of the words.

“Maybe the truest tragedy. Humanity will be gone. All traces of our existence gone.” Yuri sighed and fell back onto the bed. “Billions of years, gone, just like that.”

Yuri laughed and he laughed and laughed. It was hysteria; Otabek had to bite his lip to keep from falling into it himself. It ended in tears, in shaky hiccups.”We’re all going to fucking die,” he said bitterly. “And I don’t care. I only care that it’s  _ me _ dying.”

“Then I’m selfish too,” Otabek finally said. “We deserve it. They’re  _ our _ days to regret and to live and to lose.”

 

“Did you know,” Yuri said a few days later, “That Matilda is ten times bigger than the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs?”

He was drawing away, had filled half the notebook by now. Otabek moved, dropping his chin onto his shoulder, peering at his progress. It was a dinosaur, a t-rex, menacing and terrible. “That’s very specific knowledge.”

Yuri laughed. He had overcome the hysteria of the day before. Otabek couldn’t decide if this was better or worse. “I had a phase. Used to really like dinosaurs.” He cast the book aside and let it tumble closed to the floor. The pen followed it. “Funny, too, because I never would have remembered it, I’m sure, if—”

It didn't matter what he was going to say. Yuri sighed and fell back against his chest.

 

“I’ve been thinking about it.”

Yuri petered about the room. He had been restless, moving constantly. Manic. Otabek was manic vicariously through him. Yuri drew to a stop, pressing his heel hard into the creaking floorboards. 

He met Otabek’s eyes and he sucked in a breath. “I don’t want to be alive, when it happens.”

Oh. “They said we won’t even know,” Otabek told him quietly. “When it happens. It will be in an instant.”

“Quick,” Yuri clarified. “Painless.”

“Yeah, I expect so.”

“Doesn’t matter.” Yuri dropped onto his bed, curling hands into the blankets there like they were the only thing keeping him on the planet. “I don’t want to be around. I can’t stomach the thought.”

His neighbor had killed themself, Otabek remembered. “Okay,” he said. Yuri had said it with skittish eyes, a slight fidget in his hand--Otabek saw all his little quirks now the way he hadn’t when they’d first met. 

He stepped over to the kitchen, where he had discarded his acquisition from the pharmacy. The store name was printed across the plastic bag and for some reason Otabek found it funny. He swallowed back a laugh.

Yuri, when Otabek looked at him again, was wide eyed. Otabek shook the bag gently and the unmistakable sound of pills rattled in the silence. Otabek had made the same decision Yuri had just made, only two days after the news. And then he had met him, and plans had changed. “I was going to,” Otabek told him. But then he’d returned to his bike to find Yuri spread out on it, and Yuri had given him enough of a reason to wait.

“Oh.”

“If you want to, we can.” We. Both of them. “But I think we should sleep on it.” Yuri was quiet, eyes now on the ground. “I don’t know how much time we have left.” Maybe a few days? Maybe a week. “We don’t have to decide yet.”

Yuri shrugged. “I’ll sleep on it.”

 

He didn't say a word about it the next day, and so another listless day passed. The truth of the matter, to Otabek, was that it felt a waste to ride out the end with nothing to do in the time they had left. He had wanted to so much— _ so much _ — and he never would and it made no sense to regret it. There was nothing to do and there was nothing to be done about it.

 

Another day passed, and then Otabek woke to Yuri’s weight on the edge of the bed. In his hand was the bottle. It was large, the sort of bottle pharmacies used to dispense prescriptions from. Otabek had been amazed that he had found it, among broken glass and scattered pills. He’d taken it as a sign. But he’d also taken Yuri’s sudden arrival in his life as a different kind of sign.

“Don’t feel obligated to join me,” Yuri said. He moved and settled cross-legged on the bed beside him. Otabek looked up at him and he was smiling. His eyes were red with crying. He wondered how late Yuri had been up, turning his decision over in his mind.

“Okay.”

He stood and busied himself in the kitchen, finding two clean glasses and filling them with water.

“Both of us, at the same time,” Otabek decided as he held out Yuri’s glass. His hands shook as he took it.

Otabek took the bottle from Yuri, suddenly certain he would spill them everywhere if he tried to get them out himself, if he was even capable of opening it.

“How much will we need?”

“I don’t know. A lot, I suppose.” 

“Will we suffer, you think?” Yuri’s voice was a quiet rasp.  
“I don’t know.”

And that was it. Otabek placed his own glass on the nightstand and twisted at the cap of the bottle. The pills were large, white, coated. They would maybe go down easy. “Are you sure?”

Yuri laughed. “Does it matter? We die if we do, we die if we don’t.” He held out his hand and it trembled. Otabek didn’t bother to count, he spilled what he was certain was half into his hand. A few got away from him but neither of them bothered to chase them down. “At least this way, we have a choice.”

Otabek emptied the rest into his own hand and picked up his glass. He was shaking too, he realized, watching the slosh of water over the edge. He hadn’t even noticed.

“Okay,” he said again. He threw them down before he could change his mind. Yuri watched, breath choking from him, face grimaced in coming tears and panic. 

Quickly, he did the same.

 

Otabek woke to bile and choking and vomit and before he could figure out what was going on he was heaving, spilling it all from his throat. It came and it came until he could barely hold himself upright. It took effort not to fall into it when he finally collapsed. He was on the floor, sweaty palms pressed to the worn floorboards to help himself upright. Disoriented, he shrugged upright, back falling against the bed beside him. He took a quick glance to the bed and blond hair peeked out over the edge.

Otabek laid there on the floor for what might have been hours, hoping and hoping it would come, that his blurring vision would go black and the pills would take him; but it wouldn’t come, not now that he had thrown it all up. He had made it and he didn’t want to. He had made it and Yuri—He pulled himself upright, body lurching forward. He didn’t want to look.

He looked.

Yuri was sprawled among the blankets, still. Dead blue eyes stared off into space, body tangled in the blankets. 

Otabek dragged himself to shaky, unsteady feet, and reached forward, sweeping Yuri’s hair back from where it had fallen into his pale face. And then he checked his pulse, though he knew he was dead. Nothing, but his body was still warm. And even in death he was still beautiful.

Otabek didn’t let himself cry. He felt nothing, but not in the sense that he didn’t care. Only in the sense that there was too much to feel and so he couldn’t settle on one feeling over another. He was numb. His heart beat fast and he closed his eyes and he took a deep breath.

There were no more pills.

He stumbled about, bearings off, bile still rising in his throat. It wasn’t fair.

Yuri’s notebook was spread out next to him, open. Otabek picked it up with shaking hands, staring at the page. There were crosshatched lines, counting down the days. Yuri had known.

There were five, maybe six days left.

They’d had so much time to go.

 

Otabek didn’t know what to do, so he did nothing. He sat until he could no longer stand the sight of Yuri’s body, and then he left, because he couldn’t be anywhere  _ near _ it any longer.

 

It had finally snowed, sometime between Otabek losing consciousness and regaining it. Crisp, unbroken sheets of white lined the streets. It would be gone soon and it was a shame it wasn’t to be enjoyed by anyone save those few, like him, he chose to wander about in it.

Otabek went for his bike and it was gone. It was there when he never really needed it, and now it was gone. He fell to his knees and then it came, all of the emotions he had been refusing. He fell to his knees and he screamed and he screamed, and it rang loud down the street.

He stayed like that until he was numb. And then he stood.

He could walk the trip, it wasn’t far.

His footprints crunched loudly in the snow and he laughed. He was destroying the last bit of beauty in the world. 

The truest tragedy, Yuri had said, that the planet would be gone with them.

It took him maybe hours to get to the bridge and it was pristine, the snow here covered in a fine sheet of ice. Yuri would have glided across it but Otabek stumbled his way to the edge, still sick and dizzy from the pills, unsteady with how cold he was.

The water below was gray and ugly. Maybe it wasn’t a tragedy that  _ it _ would be gone soon. Polluted waters, the ugly gone with the beauty. Otabek stared down at it for a long, long time, until the dying light gave way to darkness. He looked at the sky, then, at the stars, at one, larger than the other.

Matilda. Their doom.

Otabek took a deep breath and looked at the waters again. The drop wasn’t far, but it was far enough.

**Author's Note:**

> If this made you sad, then I guess I've done my job. Let me know, comment or kudos.  
> You can also follow me on tumblr at melonbugg.tumblr.com


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